Friday, October 24, 2008

A wonderful site that we discovered on our journey through Penang was a street with adjacent Buddhist temples--one Thai, the other Burmese. Considering the long history of war between the two nations, I found it intriguing that these temples' gates would be directly opposite one another.

Dharmikarama Burmese Temple was our first stop, only because the taxi dropped us off on that side of the street. There are two main temples--the first had a long hallway with paintings depicting the story of Buddha, translated into English, and the second had a large standing Buddha. There were a few Burmese monks who blessed the visitors and tied braided yellow stings around their wrists.The grounds around the temple contained more statues of Buddhist deities, such as Geruda, Naga, and Panca-Rupa. There was a set of bowls that rotated in the center of a fountain for visitors to throw coins in--each bowl was for a different prayer (fortune, health, happiness, etc.), my father and Jia both hit a few bowls.

Across the street was Wat Chaiyamangalarm. This temple had beautiful painted ironwork for the gate (also surrounding the Buddha inside). We didn't walk around much of the grounds because we were rather tired (and our next stop was Thailand and its temples). We entered the main temple, which had its guardians around the door. Inside was a reclining Buddha, much like the one in Wat Pho, only much smaller. Underneath the Buddha was a shrine for the remains of monks.

About The Waiguoren

A former foreign devil from New Jersey in a foreign land of 1.4 billion. Traveling the country, reading books, and watching movies fill in the days. Drinks and adventures abound in the gan bei world called China.